<p>Our 14 yr old German Shepherd + Akeeta hybrid has recently been showing signs of a compromised hip. She is now confined to the downstairs… wants one of us to keep her company all the time when we are home. Although she seems OK, is able to go out to the backyard for her ablutions, her outings are barely 5 mins long. Rest of the time, she seems to sleep. I have been giving her painkillers in her food as the Vet advised.</p>
<p>I am concerned about the compromise in the quality of her life…at the same time, not sure if she is going through a temporary rough patch or her health is going to keep declining from here on. I really don’t want her to suffer but…at the same time I am just not sure if this is the time.</p>
<p>How does one really know when it’s time to say Goodbye to your beloved dog?</p>
<p>Oh this is so difficult. I can only tell you what we did when our wonderful lab had severe problems with arthritis. </p>
<p>It appeared that the meds did, in fact, help a lot with the pain. She slept a lot, but older dogs do that. As long as we could see that she enjoyed being with her people, enjoyed her food, was interested in smells and such, we judged that her quality of life was sufficient for us to help her with palliative care and give her extra love. There were several times when I wondered if “this was the time.” </p>
<p>Then the day came where the spinal stenosis had progressed to the point where she could not walk. She would fall over and seemed very concerned and confused. We helped to support her when she needed to go out, but I did not see that she was enjoying her life any more. As it turned out, the decision was not difficult, but our sadness was profound. She had always depended on us to do the best for her, and I think we did.</p>
<p>I don’t know if this helps. I hope it might, at least a little.</p>
<p>I’m so sorry for you. That is probably the most difficult decision I ever made, with my 15 yr old Golden Retreiver. I felt like you do, I wasn’t sure she was “that bad” yet…so, kept waiting for a sign. I eventually knew because her hips were just shot. We have hardwood floors through out the house, and she wouldn’t be able to get up by herself, at the end. She couldn’t manage stairs, and she began having accidents:( She was so ashamed of that, she’d look at me, practically saying I’m sorry with her eyes. It was a terrible time, she was such a big part of our family…But, I also couldn’t even lift her into the car by myself to get her to the vet…so, I’d have to have one of my kids help me…it just seemed to become traumatic for her…so I knew. I did ask the vet if it was too soon…and he said, no…its time. We bought a huge steak for her, and gave her a great treat…everyone hugged her and said goodbye…Then we brought her to the vet. I still miss her after 3 yrs, just as much as I did the day she was gone:(.</p>
<p>Talk to your vet if you need more guidance. This is going to be tough no matter when you decide its time. So sorry for you.</p>
<p>We went through this a few years ago with out yellow lab. She had the usual old dog problems of arthritis, some incontinence, But She had developed a cancer in her ear, had surgery to remove it, and it came back. The day I knew we had to let her go was the day I came into the kitchen in the morning and she stood in her dog bed and did not wag her tail when I greeted her. She was just gone from us already. So, So hard.</p>
<p>The link posted by julia_525 is an excellent reference. Unfortunately, it can’t make the decision for you. As mentioned, you can seek the advice of your vet.</p>
<p>The issue of pain and pain control is the primary concern in my view, but there are no easy answers. From experience, all I can say is you’ll know.</p>
<p>Our family’s experience was identical to mafool’s (post #2). When the dog couldn’t get up we called the Vet to the house (while the kids were at school). And we lied to them about how the dog had passed. And no, I don’t regret any of my decisions.</p>
<p>Our old dog, a mutt, had been having some trouble getting up and down for months. He no longer went up & down stairs and couldn’t get up from the tiled floor where he liked to lay in the summer, but he could still get up on carpet. When he would lay on the tile anyway, we’d drag over an old piece of carpet and he would get on that to stand up. But he didn’t seem to be in any pain and was always happy to see us. </p>
<p>But one day we came home, and he was laying in the middle of the living room. He had thrown up and could not stand. It took 3 of us to get him in the car and to the vet, and they kept him for a couple of days. The vet said it was either a stroke, a tumor, or a cerebral incident, but without a cat scan they couldn’t tell. Since he was 14, we decided to try steroids for a few days to see if there was any improvement. He was still a very feisty patient at the vet’s. We brought him home for 3 days. We fed him by hand all his favorite tidbits and gave him his pills tucked in jelly donuts. But by the third day, he didn’t even raise his head to look when we came in the room, and we knew it was time.</p>
<p>iit is pretty hard.
At xmas our 14.5 yr old lab was very ill, wouldn’t eat or drink- had to squeeze water in her mouth from a cotton ball- couldn’t get up. Of course was the weekend and I had to be out of town.
Anyway- vet school is harder to get in, because animals can’t always tell you what is the matter. The vet also won’t tell you what to do.
My H took our dog in and they recommended an emergency vet- by that time I was home and we went together. However- I was wanting a clear answer- they did some tests and all I got were vague scenarios all involving large amounts of money/stress. ( we went for door #3- surgery to remove spleen- took a chance and she has had a remarkable recovery- doing very well)</p>
<p>anyway- regarding joints- our dog has been on pain medication as well as doggie chondrotin/glucosamine for years. ( as well as other stuff)
if your dog isn’t on anything- I think that could make a tremendous difference.
[Dasuquin</a> Chew Tabs With MSM - Allivet Trusted Pet Pharmacy](<a href=“http://www.allivet.com/Dasuquin-MSM-p/27004.htm]Dasuquin”>http://www.allivet.com/Dasuquin-MSM-p/27004.htm)
this is what our dog is on.
However- if she has already been on high quality supplements and you have confidence in the vet- you will know that you have done the right thing when it is time.</p>
<p>If you’re open to the sense that the time is coming, I think you will know when you get there. Doesn’t make it easy. I wrestled with this question with our sweet old dog but there was a point when I just knew it was time and I went ahead and made the decision to choose a time when I knew we could get the help of our long-time vet (eg: not the emergency vet or a sub) and not be in a crisis/emergency. Our dog was just tired out, in pain, and ready to go at 16. It was hard but I was glad because my son could share in the process and we could all be there together.</p>
<p>I learned the value of being proactive when I went through my first dog grief (some 20 years ago) and the same vet had told me "Most people learn with their first dog and then say “I waited too long the first time.” It helped me not wait too long with either one.</p>
<p>That said the sweet old dog described above had a crisis some 3 years prior to her end where she was by all lab results failing but looking bright eyed and happy to see us and we decided to do nothing heroic or surgical and just manage her pain and she recovered to have 3 more good years. So it is definitely worth trying some manageable/affordable intervention to see if your beloved one rallies. I do think that dogs do not worry/fret/ suffer like humans. They endure pain, but they do not have regrets or worries and are in the moment and very happy just to be with us in the moment until time to let go.</p>
<p>Unfortunately the life cycles of our pets do not mesh with our own. It is never easy losing a loving member of the family. As we have been married for 22 years we are now cycling through the second round of dogs and cats. We are of the firm belief not to try to extend the lives of these pets. I knew that Daisy our airdale/lab mix was ready to go when she would not follow me around the backyard when I mowed the lawn. One thing that we do is to have the vet come to the house to put them to sleep. This is a great service as taking the pets to the Vet is so stressful for our animals. The vet comes and all the other animals are there by the side of the dying pet. It is very peaceful and serene. The vet takes the dead animal and a week or so later we get back the ashes. We put all the ashes of the pets in one container and it sits in the living room.</p>
<p>we had a dog when i was younger. she was very old and lost her eye sight - walked into everything. it turned out she had some tumor in her which was pressing against her eyes and is what caused her to lose her sight. we wound up putting her to sleep because she was pretty much terminal.</p>
<p>While reading the posts (it’s almost midnight here), I suddenly heard a gagging “YARK” and retching from my son’s bedroom (where the dog sleeps although son is at school). I jumped up and ran in to find my 10 year old lab trying to eat the mess he’d just barfed up. He looked up at me, embarrassed. I got him outside in short order and he strolled around the yard for twenty minutes, taking in the bracing air. He came back in wagging his tail, picked up a slipper and brought it to me. Knucklehead!</p>
<p>He has severe joint problems and I was worried about him while reading everyone’s posts. Weird that he needed some special attention right then.</p>
<p>Pharmagal, you’ve gotten lots of great advice here, but only you will know. If only they could live longer. I have a theory about their short lives: They would miss us too much if they outlived us and they wouldn’t understand where we’d gone.</p>
<p>To the OP this is a really tough situation. I do not think there is an exactly “right” time to decide to put a pet down … the best you can do is do your best at deciding when your pet’s quality of life has deteriated too far. We had a terrific German Shepard with hip issues … at one point she could no longer walk on our hardwood floors so we put rugs down everywhere … then she could not do the stairs so I carried her up and down the stairs … then eventually she didn’t really move from her bed. We stuck with it through this because there were substantial portions of the day she seemed happy. Once she couldn’t really get around her mood really dropped and her quality of life really dropped (when we came home from work she often was sitting in her body fluids because she couldn’t move) … then we knew although she was in excellent health other than her hips it was time. In hindsight we probably waited a little too long … but we did the best we could for our beloved pet … and in the big picture were probably right within a week or two of a better timing (we were a little late). For me this was a very tough decision … at 50 putting down our dog is on my very short list of the toughest/worst decisions I’ve ever had to make. Ultimately I think you’ll know that is time … that your pet will better off no longer going through the pain/situation of her/his current life. I wish you the best working through this .</p>
<p>We have been through this at our house and it was SO hard for the whole family. We saw our dear old dog declining–lethargic and ‘clingy’. We decided as a family if he was in pain, we’d put him down because we didn’t want him to suffer. He wouldn’t eat at times, but always drank from his water bowl. We took him to the vet for guidance. They ran a ton of blood tests and told us that, for a dog his age, he was doing pretty well. He hung on for about 6 weeks. We switched his food a number of times to entice him to eat, bought rotisserie chickens for him, and loved him like crazy. There were days he wouldn’t eat, but would eat the next day. He just went to sleep and didn’t wake up one afternoon, dying peacefully in his bed. We were–still are–grateful that we didn’t have to put him down. Our standard was pain…if he was in pain, we’d take the next step. Never had any indication of that.</p>
<p>OP, I hope you can find peace with whatever decision you have to make regarding your beloved dog. They are members of our families and grieving for them is to be expected. Bless you.</p>
<p>Masslou, like you, I am grateful that we didn’t have to make that choice with our first yellow lab. She was 13, and had been steadily deteriorating. The key sign for us was when she stopped eating. That seemed to be her way of telling us it was time. Had it not been New Years day (the Vet’s office was closed) we probably would have brought her in. She left us peacefully on her favorite bed with all of us around her giving us all the love we could. (I’m tearing up thinking about it).</p>
<p>One of the few times I’ve seen my husband cry (sob, actually) was many years ago, when he had just taken his old dachshund, who he had since he was 12, to the vet to be put down. No matter how sure you are that it’s the right thing to do, it is still a sad day.</p>
<p>Don’t wait too long. I’ve made that mistake twice (once with a cat with feline leukemia, once with a dog with kidney failure due to Lyme disease). The cat wound up dying violently and in pain in my arms. The dog – I loved her so much, it was incredibly hard to let go, and six years later her picture is still on my office bookshelf – had to start vomiting blood all over the house to convince me it was time. As awful as it is to make a decision to say goodbye to a beloved pet, it’s even more traumatic to have a painful end in the middle of your kitchen.</p>
<p>(As many on this board will understand) I have had too many opportunities on the ranch to face down this decision. Life is hard out here and (most of) our “pets” have “jobs”. Barn cats and herd dogs and protector dogs. After all these years I think I can see what needs to done in their eyes …but that doesn’t make it any easier. The end around here doesn’t come with a vet bill attached.</p>
<p>The end is coming too soon for our “ranch poodle” (affectionately known as “Poodle”. She doesn’t have a job. ;)). This one will be hard for me and may kill my wife.</p>
<p>I feel for you, Pharmagal. I really do. But maybe you can take some solace that your decision, when made, is made out of selfless love and genuine kindness. </p>
<p>“No animal shall suffer needlessly on my watch.”</p>
<p>We’ve had to put down two dogs. For one, a black chow mix, who was suffering from bone cancer, I made the decision by looking in his eyes. It was time. For the other, a collie, it was a long, gentle deterioration followed one day by a stroke which caused her to be unable to walk. </p>
<p>Our current dog is a Saint Bernard, 8 years old (average lifespan for the breed is 7 years) and I am dreading the downward path that I know will be coming. </p>
<p>Luckily, the two cats are only middle-aged.</p>
<p>I totally understand. The first dog we had to put down I waited too long. She had stopped eating and we basically force fed her. She had a throat tumor and just could not chew well. Slipping from helping get soft food to her to being the only feeding was gradual. One day she went in the back yard and hid under a bush. She would not come out when called. Her eyes said it. “Let me go”. It was such a hard thing to do even then. I hope I am better at recognizing it with the current dog. He is almost fourteen but still spry…</p>